Anne Clapp shows you how to plant your azaleas properly.
Lots of azaleas die because they're not planted properly.
To make that perfect hole for an azalea, find a place in the yard that has soil that will drain fairly quickly. It needs to be in an area where you have shade and certainly no afternoon sun for the plant.
The hole should be at least as wide as the outside edges of the plant and about the depth of the container.
Break up the soil in the bottom of the hole and then add some bark and a little bit of composted manure and mix all of that together. That brings that soil level up a little bit in the hole, so when you put the plant in the ground, it is going to have at least one inch of the top of the root ball out of the ground.
Water it in a little bit so it will settle nicely then pull the rest of the soil up around the root ball of that plant.
That plant is going to be able to grow a good root system and it is going to be able to withstand heat and drought of the North Carolina summer.